Relationship between Juvenile Delinquency, Sensation Seeking, and Impulsivity: Focusing on Delinquency-Onset Type

Abstract

The main purpose of this study was to find the relationship between the delinquency-onset time in the source and the continuity of delinquency. In order to achieve this objective, we divided 350 first-year high school students into three groups early-onset type, late-onset type, and non-delinquent adolescents on the basis of the delinquency onset. The results of this study were as follow: (1) for the boys, the early-onset type shows a higher continuity of delinquency than both the late-onset type and the general adolescents. On the other hand, for the girls, the early-onset type shows a higher continuity of delinquency than the late-onset type, but there was no difference in the persistence duration between the late-onset type and the non-delinquent adolescents. (2) For the boys, the examination reveals that the early-onset type has a higher degree of sensation seeking and impulsivity than the general adolescents. In addition, the early-onset type shows a higher degree of sensation seeking than the late-onset type, whereas the two show no difference in impulsivity. For the girls, sensation seeking did not show any difference depending on the delinquency onset. However, more impulsivity appeared in the early-onset type than in the late-onset type or the non-delinquent adolescents. (3) The relative priorities of variables determining the group to which the students belong on the basis of the delinquency onset are in the order of sensation seeking and juvenile impulsivity. Therefore, this study, suggests that the early-onset type requires a different kind of intervention than the late-onset type. Keywords: adolescent delinquency, early-onset type, late-onset type, sensation seeking, impulsivity